Prayer
by Valieara
Summary: MidOne Breath. In a different world, he sleeps slouched in a chair in the hospital. He can’t begrudge her this, the experience that, like it or not, he’s a part of. He made a promise, as close to a prayer as he could get.


**_Disclaimer:_** The X-Files _is property of Chris Carter and 1013 Productions, with whom I have no affiliation. For recreational purposes only, no monetary gain. Phrases in parentheses are from the Lord's Prayer._

_**Spoilers:** Vaguely for_ Beyond the Sea_, definitely for_ One Breath_, but I'm pretty sure everyone has seen those._

_**Notes:** Yes, I'll get off the abduction-arc soon. The lake scenes are just so beautifully done that I had to do this - which went from the original 500 words to about 2000+. Feedback is always appreciated._

* * *

The fog rolls in, around, and above, clouding what little remains of perception and reality. Simultaneously breathlessly still and constantly moving, it touches the water and is reflected by it, rolling further along on its unspoken and unmarked journey. And there amid the heaviness, she drifts, staring at him. It's an empty stare, full of far away thoughts, and one he's so accustomed to seeing on her face it shouldn't bother him in any other place but here. It's the look that says

_don't look for me here;_

_let me think deep thoughts, and I'll get back to you; _

_no, I'm not fine, as much as I say I am. _

And like the water surrounding her eyes, they reflect more than deflect the heaviness around them, unconsciously blocking him out from where he stands dejected and watching in the distance.

It's the first time he's seen her, truly seen her, in a long time, and somehow, it isn't what he expected. For a man who wants so desperately to believe, he has a hard time accepting what he most wants to – a practice and myth that has never been proven, but accepted by those others who have stood on the shore and _seen_.

Without meaning to, a person can be changed by a personal view simply through the intimacy of a moment, and in that moment, understand and believe. The irony here lays in the fact that the one who now stares vacantly at him across the water, the one who brought him here, is one who before would never have accepted this; that before, conversely he would have been the one to believe, accepting without question because _why not_? What proof _wasn't_ there?

Thus would have begun another friendly metaphysical debate in the basement office just because he liked to know more about her; and, if he was being honest, he liked to rile her. He's pretty sure she knew that, but she played along anyway – maybe because like him, and as a scientist, she was curious; maybe just because she was humoring him; but probably just because under her somewhat annoyed front, she'd enjoyed it as much as he had.

He's dreaming. He knows it. And maybe it really isn't anything more than what it seems, and the answer is for once in his life the most logical solution, but in this moment, in this place, he believes it's more. In a different world, he sleeps slouched in a chair in the hospital, keeping a vigil over Scully, who has seized her chance and drawn him to her in-between. This is what he believes, though the _whys_, frustratingly, have yet to be ascertained: why she would seize onto him and bring him here to watch her sit and stare blankly, why she would choose to put him through more, why she would make him watch as she decides when he can only sit and do nothing – too much like the world she's drawn him from. Weightiness pours from her thoughts and her illusory body.

He doesn't doubt it's really her, but he doubts her intentions.

He knows what weighty thoughts she's having, and he's had enough of them back in the real world. His senses screams at him to do something, to pick up the rope and pull her to shore, to wake up, to stop her, _something_, but he can't begrudge her this, the experience that, like it or not, he's a part of. He made a promise, as close to a prayer as he could get.

_I'm here._

So he sits on the dock, locks eyes with her vacant ones, and waits as hours pass, the light unchanging and muted. It's peaceful enough, and he isn't constantly assuaged by his anger and remorse, though whether it's because she's here or because of wherever _here_ is, he doesn't know, and maybe this was her intent.

_Mulder, come on, you've been up twenty-two hours, you need a break. Let me drive for a while._

Her calm breaths jar the rowboat she floats peacefully in only slightly, but the ripples she creates still make it to the algae ridden and water saturated wood of the dock supporting him. It is his only connection with her, and he relishes it, knowing it might be his last. It reminds him of comfortable silences and stolen glances and deep, slow breaths and the trust that comes with it. Friendship. Familiarity.

She looks up, her eyes brilliant and tired but not surprised to see him. She smiles, and it's hard not to match her expression of relieved content.

_I'm here_, it says.

* * *

"_You're a believer, Scully?"_

_She took her eyes from the road long enough to give him a look, one he couldn't quite put into words then, but looking back with his experience now can translate as _Not like you_. His lips quirked upward a little, and he clarified, nodding his head toward her necklace._

"_Your cross. I've never really noticed before. You're a believer?"_

"_A Catholic."_

_He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. "Didn't answer the question," he pointed out. "I could've gotten that off your file." At her glance, he amended. "Okay, so I _did_ get it off your file."_

_She hesitated, the streetlights lighting her hair and throwing her into shadow, alternately and repeatedly. "Yes," she finally answered. _

"_Are you sure about that?" he questioned gently. "Because you don't sound too sure."_

_Her fingers tightened around the steering wheel and her face tensed. "Dammit, Mulder, why are we even having this conversation?"_

"_Because I brought it up," he said rationally. He threw a sunflower seed shell out the window, and reached into the bag for another, knowing that she was cursing him in her seat for his seeming nonchalance in the face of such serious questions. He stopped, in deference to her need for him to outwardly act as seriously as he was thinking, a facet of her he was only just learning to respect. "Don't you believe faith grows and strengthens with its testing?"_

_It was a slightly ambiguous, purposely general question, meant to cover all the bases of possibility that had been created over the past year, and she'd known it. She'd let out a breath, and gotten that look on her face for a moment, and he knew she was going to evade his question again. "Is that why your belief is so strong?"_

_He had been half-right, and he allowed himself a half-smile at that. "You didn't answer the question, Scully," he answered her. _

_She'd smiled in return, understanding.

* * *

_

Her eyes close before he can decide to do or say anything, and instead of her flushed, smiling and startlingly clear face, he is faced with her pale and utterly drained form, and the waves of incapability and depression the fog had held at bay wash over him relentlessly.

He's seen her. She's made her decision. It's enough, and it's over.

_(Thy will be done, on earth as in heaven.)_

It had been during a road trip, ask him and he honestly can't tell you which one, only that it was soon after her father had died. Scully had been behind the wheel, after her nagging that he needed a break and yes, she could drive and she'd even prove it if he pulled over, and his teasing her when she had to drastically readjust the seat to reach the pedals. It was dusky outside, time to find a local motel, but they both figured they could get to wherever they were going if they put in a few more hours. Motels were never full up, even in the middle of the night, and that was really the only problem either could think of, excepting accidents and speeding tickets. He remembered it being nice to actually be the passenger for once, take in the sparse and sadly lacking scenery, though try as he might, he couldn't seem to fall asleep in the passenger seat the way Scully did. He might not need a bed, but a couch would be nice, and Scully refused point-blank to allow him to put down the seat and lay down while they were on the highway, so in between a floor-full of sunflower seed shells Scully protested with another one of her looks (_It _is_ a rental car, Mulder_) and playing one-sided games of _I Spy_, he became the observer. It was the first time he'd ever really noticed the slip of a gold chain and charm she wore around her neck, and he'd called her on it.

_You're a believer, Scully?_

Some things were overly ironic, and yet made so much sense. This was one of them.

He hadn't lied when he'd told Mrs. Scully that Scully's religion wasn't something he'd ever considered about her beliefs. He had known she was Catholic, its symbol declaring itself from where it rested in the hollow of her throat. His hand goes to it resting against his own neck, unconsciously, much as he'd seen Scully do once in a while; a reaffirmation, a reassurance, different and yet so much the same for both of them.

_You give it to her when you find her._

A nod, a promise, a prayer.

_(Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil)_

He leaves after brushing a final kiss to her forehead, hoping she can feel it, or the intent of it; wishing at the same time that she can sense his tangled emotions and that she is shielded from them, peaceful now as she is. It is something he desperately wants her to know and feel in one last effort to bring her back, and something he has no right to impress on her. He doesn't glance back as he leaves, refusing to torture himself with a last useless look at her body, slowly draining of life even as he watches. He's seen her, or dreamt her. Either way, if this is closure, it's a long way from _okay_ and _fine_, but it's closer from where he had been, more than he'd gotten before, and probably more than he deserves. And for that, he's thankful.

_(Deliver us)_

It's still dark outside, the rising sun just piercing the sky and highlighting the clouds with shards of bright red; this, Mulder thinks, is appropriate. Melissa is coming in as he leaves and she gives him a long look, before gently gripping his shoulder in understanding.

"Did you see her?" she asks, softly.

It's a double entendre, phrased carefully or unintentionally, he doesn't know. He can only bring himself to nod, head bowed, and Melissa doesn't push it.

"I'll give you a call."

There's an unspoken _later _and _soon,_ maybe a _today _tacked onto the end of the sentence, and for the first time, he accepts it. He hasn't allowed himself to go numb, not yet.

_You wanna drive, Scully?_ A teasing rattling of keys, a rolling of eyes hiding amusement.

The drive to his apartment is dull and mindless, and his expression betrays nothing so that he can collapse in private, in an apartment destroyed as a testament to his own _Amen_, his own _so be it_ and _to strengthen_. For the next twelve hours he holds a silent, unconventional vigil of his own next to the phone, and waits an eternity for it to ring.

* * *

"_The word _amen_ derives from a Hebrew word meaning 'to strengthen' or 'confirm'," she'd said. "Eventually it became incorporated into the Church and therefore its language, where it came to mean literally 'let it be so'."_

_Mulder smiled a little at that. "Mother Mary comes to me, speaking words of wisdom?"_

_Scully smiled back indulgently, which was all he'd been trying for. "Sort of. At least, in the terms I've thought about it, it's not really a plea_;_ more of an acceptance of whatever comes as God's will."_

"_Sounds like you've thought about it a lot, Scully."_

_Again, she tensed, but he was glad to see her relax soon afterward. "Yeah, I guess I have."_

"Amor fati_," he finally said, and Scully glanced at him again._

"_Love fate?" guessed Scully, after a second._

_Mulder nodded. "Putting your fate in the hands of the gods, knowing and understanding, accepting that you have no control over what happens in life. It's dark, and yet hopeful, but only because there is no other conclusion to come to." He had veered in his own thoughts, and suddenly it didn't really seem to be that similar to her own theology after all. She didn't notice or didn't comment, most likely the latter, merely taking it in. He only leaned against the window and closed his eyes briefly when they started to burn against the twenty-two hours they'd been open, acknowledging that maybe she was right, before he glanced at her gently. "It's a hard place to come to, either way."_

_He had sensed her agreement in the ensuing silence, and her understanding. "Do you believe in fate, Mulder?" she had asked. _

"_If there's an iced tea in the back," he had joked, and suddenly it was old, familiar ground. Unlike himself, she hadn't pressed it, and he didn't know whether to be disappointed or relieved.

* * *

_

The phone rings, a harsh rattle, a foretelling of the one last breath he couldn't bring himself to watch and hear. She drifts, and fades.

"This is Fox Mulder, I'm not here"

_You're a believer, Scully? _

_I'm here._

He picks up. "I'm here," he echoes aloud.

_(For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory forevermore)_

Amen.


End file.
